And the Wind Howled
by Suicidal Button
Summary: 'After all, he could hardly die of hypothermia when he was already dead, now could he? The thought made Remus laugh, harshly and hysterically'-- Written for FP's Fanfic 3 competition, Remus has no party after death. He doubts he deserves it anyway. Dark


**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter**

Warnings: Dark, angsty, all that good stuff.

Been proof-read again.

XxXxXxX

Remus... wasn't too sure what to make of death, really.

Time held no control over this surreal plane. He may have died two hours ago or two weeks ago, he didn't know. He desperately wanted to, though.

It was terribly lonely. He was stranded... somewhere. Outdoors, he supposed. Surrounded by miles and miles of fields of grass. Just fields; no fences. No crops. No cattle. No variation. The sky was always an incredibly gloomy grey, and the landscape was just as miserable.

Remus had so far walked, sat, lain, ran, screamed, cursed and reasoned. Nothing worked. Swearing at Merlin or muggle Gods or Voldemort did absolutely nothing, just caused his throat to dry up a little, and made him more miserable, listening to his voice echo and travel, with no one to hear it. There was no-one to reason with, although he'd tried. He'd tried walking the great stretch of grass that was before him, but there was no change in scenery.

Remus wondered if this was his punishment. His punishment for being a werewolf, for harming people in battle, for not loving Tonks, not loving his child enough. For not giving Harry enough attention.

Or maybe even for allowing Sirius to die.

If any of these were the case, he knew he deserved it. That this was his own torture to make him pay for all the wrongs he'd done. It was like hell, the one the muggles always described with such abstract fear, with fire and brimstone and the devil. Only, you didn't need any of that to pay for your sins. Being alone, here, was much more torturous than being burnt alive and flayed with whips and having the devil laugh mockingly in your ear as you screamed for forgiveness.

Having no-one to hear you as you screamed for forgiveness was much more painful.

Remus lay on the grass, always slightly damp with dew, unchanging, undenting no matter how many times he lay on it or trod on it or sat on it or dug his fingers in and tried to just _rip _it out. He stared up at the grey clouds that always gave the appearance of rain to come, but never actually rained. They didn't even move like normal clouds. Just stayed there, unwavering, not allowing any sun to come through.

Sometimes, Remus wanted to jump up, high up, reach those clouds with his hands and rip them apart, create massive tears in the fluffy material and cry in relief as the sun shone through to warm up his face and dry his tears. But hoping did nothing. That was a lesson he was learning all too well.

Sirius would have done something about it. He wouldn't have just sat around and hoped he'd be rescued, that this was only a stage of death that would pass soon. No, Sirius would _make _it pass. He'd somehow get right up there, fly through the clouds, fly through the sky and 'ascend into heaven'. Joining everyone else who deserved to be up there, to experience happiness, to see all their loved ones who they'd lost.

Remus let himself think of what Sirius would do, of what James or Lily or Tonks would do, those brave, strong friends of his, who would be disappointed in his weakness, in how he'd given up hope the moment he'd seen what death was truly like.

But they wouldn't understand what had driven him to lose hope. They had nothing to be ashamed of.

Occasionally, Sirius spoke to him of an overwhelming guilt that ran through him every time he laid eyes on Harry, so sure was he that he'd robbed the boy of his parents. But slowly, Sirius had overcome that guilt, focusing instead on his hatred for the traitor, Wormtail, and his love for his godson, and his joy at being near Remus again. With this, he'd shaken off the guilt somewhat, his shoulders had begun to lift, his eyes brightened, and the lines embedded in his face, obtained throughout the harsh years of Azkaban, didn't seem as deep.

James and Lily, they had lived happy lives, each one throwing themselves into the present, never looking back and never worrying about the future, although once it had been revealed to them that Voldemort was after their only child, Lily had begun to fret over Harry's life to be, and James was always looking over his shoulder, certain a Death Eater was hiding in their muggle fridge, ready to jump out and take his precious boy away.

And Tonks... gosh, Remus had caused Tonks so much pain, and none of that was through any fault of her own. He just... he just knew he'd never be able to love her, although he had tried so hard, because Tonks wouldn't let him go even when he wanted to give up inside. And he couldn't even begin to think of abandoning her after she'd become pregnant with their lovely little boy. He'd almost entertained the idea of leaving their loveless relationship, saving the three of them from the pain of his forced affection, but Harry had swiftly smacked that idea out of his head, seething with rage, causing Remus to feel guiltier than he'd ever felt in his life.

Remus flinched slightly at the remembered guilt he felt, still felt, over how much pain he'd caused Harry, over how he'd failed at being there for the boy, and managed to get himself killed in the end, when Harry would most likely need him most. Oh, Sirius would murder him. Remus was almost thankful he was here, and not with the rest of his friends in the 'real' afterlife.

_Almost_ thankful.

He shook his head on the grass, trying to blink back tears, steadily ignoring the stinging in his nose and the lump forming in his throat. Merlin, he thought he'd ran out of tears when he realised where he was going to be for the rest of his afterlife. Forever.

"You stupid fool," Remus croaked out to himself, lifting a hand and wiping at his tears. He wished he could sleep. It might make this seem more bearable, pass time by, although the time confused him greatly, and sleeping might only enhance that confusion. But at least it would mean he could do _something_. But no, he couldn't even sleep, and he never felt tired. He wasn't hungry. He wasn't thirsty. He didn't need the toilet.

No, nothing could distract him from his emotions. Whoever even thought of this trap, God or whoever it was, was a genius of torture.

Remus had always been of the practical opinion that when you die, you die. That was it. Your brain shut down in your body, and nothing else happened. Sirius had always believed that when you die, you did whatever you wanted to do. You got reincarnated, you went up to heaven, you haunted castles or you spied on your loved ones who were still alive. James... well, he believed you spent all of eternity waiting for the special someone you'd spent your life with, and then when they died, you were together. Forever.

Sirius had always looked rather upset at that theory, so certain was he that he'd never settle down. It was quite upsetting for Remus, too. Who would ever want to love a werewolf?

Remus had always abhorred that curse he'd carried all his life. He wanted it back, now. Anything for a bit of familiarity, something to do. Or even just a way to tell the time, really, to tell when a month had passed, because not knowing was going to drive him insane.

Sometimes, Remus had thought he'd be better off dead. One less werewolf contaminating the earth, running the threat of killing someone when controlled by the moon. Remus didn't want to be dead now. He wanted to be alive, taking care of his son, taking care of Harry, who was barely an adult, no matter what he'd been subjected to throughout life.

"I don't want to be dead," Remus murmured to himself, eyes narrowing at the sky desperately. How he wished his perception of death was right. That you just died, and there was nothing after.

"Don't want to be dead," Remus said again, turning to curl up on his side. The grass prickled his face, not allowing itself to be squashed.

"I don't want to be dead!" Remus said, louder, a half-shout. His hands snaked up to fist in his greying hair and he sobbed bitterly, tugging the strands so hard it hurt, although they didn't break away from his scalp. Another affliction of the dead, he supposed. Hair that stayed put.

"Don't let me be dead," he groaned out, as if someone would just waltz along and announce that because Remus didn't want to be dead, he could come back to life in a corpse that was already decaying, ten feet underground, or maybe even burnt to a cinder.

"Please." No matter how grotesque the image, he wanted someone to say he could do it anyway. Even if he was just an inanimate pile of ash, anything would be better than this.

"Oh Moony."

Remus sighed slightly, James' voice fluttering to mind. A deep, slightly cracking voice. Even after puberty, it wasn't exactly reliable. Always a source of amusement between his friends.

"Moony." Remus just wished he wasn't thinking of James' voice _now_. It made it all so much worse. To be imagining his best friend, right there, in the open, abandoned field. It hit Remus how he'd never, ever hear that voice again, like he had hoped he would when he first realised he was dead and in the afterlife.

"Remus, please," the voice whispered again. Remus whimpered, fingers fisting tighter in his hair, causing his eyes to water. Or maybe it was the sheer memory doing that.

A touch on his arm made Remus jump. He immediately shot up, eyes darting all around him. James! James was here! His voice and the touch on his arm and...

Remus' eyes scanned for James' familiar figure frantically, eyebrows lowering in confusion when he saw... nothing. There was no-one. Just the grass, and the sky. And the wind.

Wind.

The wind that hadn't been there before, hadn't tugged at Remus' robe, making him believe, in all his wishful thinking, that James had finally come for him, to take him away from this, to laugh at his pathetic state, clap him on the back and say 'we're going home now, Moony ol' boy.'

Remus let out a strangled cry and punched the ground. The wind howled softly at him. Like it sympathised with him.

Remus laid back on the grass and closed his eyes.

Time passed by, or at least, he liked to think it did. The wind never went away, oddly. He didn't know why it had started when it had been so still before. But he liked the wind, in an odd way. The noises it made were comforting, even if the grass didn't move and the clouds stayed still.

It was really rather useless wind, really.

Remus was walking, as he was often prone to do, although nothing ever changed. He never came across anything new. Not a fence, nor a gate, nor a sheep, or a village.

But it was calming, walking endlessly, although the fact that his heart never sped up, that he never broke out in a sweat or ran out of breath had often upset him, and still did. Another reminder of the humanity that he'd lost when he wound up there.

So Remus paced the grass, steadfastly ignoring the oddity of not tiring out, and that the grass was never crushed underfoot, and that the clouds never changed for even a second, which sometimes made him wonder if he was even walking anywhere, because it seemed like he wasn't taking one step in any direction.

"Remus?" Remus smiled slightly at the voice. The wind sometimes sounded like it was saying his name as it brushed past him, although it was probably his over-active imagination and the desperate need for comfort that had latched onto this image.

"Remus, old boy." Sometimes, if he thought hard enough, closed his eyes and pretended, the wind sounded like Sirius. Remus stopped walking and stood still for a moment, closing his eyes and listening to the wind.

"Moony, mate." Sirius would clap him on the back or ruffle his hair and give Remus that wonderful, expressive smile he saved for his closest friends, as opposed to the devilish, lop-sided grin he shot the ladies.

Remus gave a small start as his hair was ruffled by the breeze. He couldn't help but drop to his knees and relish in this small touch, so similar to Sirius' actions.

"Moony." The whisper felt like it was right in his ear and his eyes flew open as he felt arms slide around him. Just as quick as the sensation had come, it went, leaving Remus to keel over, gasping at what he was sure he felt but for a moment.

However, when Remus closed his eyes again and desperately tried to get it back, get that feeling back, he couldn't. The spell was broken.

It was just the wind again. The wind which had picked up from the usual gentle breeze, now becoming rougher, tugging at his clothing.

Remus leant forward and buried his face in the stubborn grass.

And when he had the strength to get up again, he passed more time by walking.

Remus walked and walked and _walked_, occasionally sitting down to bring _some _amount of change in his routine, but for the most part, he walked. Because he could. Because his limbs never grew heavy and his body was never tired.

The wind had continued it's slightly harsher attack, never gentling and never worsening. Just like before. Remus sometimes wanted to scream at it to change. Because nothing else changed.

By Merlin, he wanted change. Pleaded for it, lived for a change in _something_. Remus snorted at his own pun. Lived for it. Heh.

It was slowly driving him insane. His emotions were changing rapidly, he would laugh at memories, then start crying, then start yelling at the fucking grass and the fucking wind and the fucking clouds and those fucking memories. He would curse and curse and then cry again because since when did Remus Lupin, rule-abiding, well-mannered Remus Lupin, ever, _ever_ curse?

And the voices in the wind were making him worse. At first, they were a comfort. And as Remus grew ever more weary of this plane, they still were a comfort. But they were turning on him, slowly but surely.

He heard Tonk's voice on the wind once. He was sitting and pulling at the grass, frustrated as it wouldn't uproot, just staying glued to the soil which he'd tried to prod at, only to find it hard as rock.

"Remus." Remus shuddered, arms rising to wrap around his middle. The moment he heard that familiar, lovely voice, he felt guilt flood through him like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over his head. Twice.

"Remus, why?" the voice whispered to him, the wind stroking over his face, pulling his hair to cover his eyes. He just wanted to sweep it back, but couldn't move. Didn't want to move. He was terrified that if he moved one inch, he would lose the voice. The illusion that Tonks was there. Because for all the guilt he felt, he had this idea that he might be able to feel better if he just sat there and actually _listened_ to Tonks, something he'd failed to do during his life.

"Remus, just listen to me," the wind-voice commanded, and Remus could remember the desperate tone of voice Tonks would use whenever she asked this, the resigned look in her eye because she knew he would ignore her and walk away, thinking of his past, thinking of Sirius, but never thinking of her.

Merlin, he was so despicable.

"Listen. Why won't you?" the wind moaned, and Remus shivered, feeling cold for the first time. He hadn't felt the temperature before, but suddenly he could.

"Do you love me?" the voice asked, and Remus couldn't suppress the near-animalistic, pitiful sound that escaped from his throat. The voice didn't return for a moment and Remus' breathing increased, so certain was he that it would never come back, that he'd never be able to listen to Tonks again.

"Do you love our son?" Tonks would always cup her stomach when she asked this, and then, when Teddy was born, she would hold him to her protectively, as if worried Remus' answer would hurt him somehow, which never failed to send hurt shooting to _his _heart. Remus would always answer yes to that, and always, always mean it. He loved - _loves -_ Teddy with all his heart.

"You regret it!" the voice accused. Remus shook his head, mumbling a series of protests. Out of the whole relationship, Teddy was the only thing Remus could never regret.

Remus continued shaking his head, drawing his knees up to his chest, wrapping his arms around them, as if to protect himself. The wind died down slightly, and Remus knew that the voice wasn't coming back. This filled him with relief and it filled him with a deep ache.

The wind again increased with a vengeance, stronger than before, enough to cause Remus' teeth to chatter with the cold.

And this continued, the wind staying exactly the same again, never dying down. Remus spent most of his time lying on his side, curled up protectively, shivering from the cold but never experiencing any physical affliction. After all, he could hardly die of hypothermia when he was already dead, now could he?

The thought made Remus laugh, harshly and hysterically.

Sometimes he imagined fingers carding through his hair. Sirius' fingers. He'd look up and see Sirius smiling sadly down at him, eyes glistening with un-shed tears, all Remus' fault. Then the image would fade and he'd be staring at those damn clouds, and his eyes would narrow, and his lip would curl, and he'd wish for his wand because he just wanted to dissolve those clouds.

But he didn't deserve to do that, did he? He deserved everything dished out to him because he'd ruined Tonks' life and hadn't helped Sirius as he should have and he'd let down his son and he'd let down Harry.

Merlin, did Harry even survive? Did his son even survive? He remembered the ripping agony he'd felt when Tonks was struck down right before his eyes. He could feel that same agony at the thought of Voldemort besting Harry, killing him brutally as he surely would have. Teddy would have been murdered soon after, as the Death Eaters ransacked all of the Order member's houses.

But no, that wouldn't ever happen. Harry was so strong, he would have defeated Voldemort, and Remus was certain that was what happened. He felt such a surge of pride at the very thought.

Remus would spend an age thinking on this, paranoid Harry had been murdered by Voldemort, then joyful when he convinced himself it was the other way around.

Remus would sometimes imagine bright green eyes looking at him. Sometimes they were bespectacled, Harry's eyes, and he was smiling and laughing and Remus loved him.

Sometimes Remus would be engulfed by the powerful scent of lilies, and soft chuckles that would make him grin, and fiery red hair would flash before his eyes. Lily. Lily, who'd been disgruntled that James had brought her the scent of her own name for her birthday, but then fell in love with the perfume and worn it ever since. Lily, who refused to cut her own hair short no matter how many times she would complain about how difficult it was to manage.

Lily, or 'Evans' or 'Flower', or one of many pet names James had for her.

And sometimes Lily would be standing with James, in Remus' hallucinations, and they'd both be grinning down at him, talking about something he had no hope of understanding because he was too enraptured by their faces, by the fact that they were _there_.

Occasionally, he'd imagine a baby in Lily or James' arms, but it was gone in a flash. Sometimes Sirius would be standing behind them, ready to surprise James with a playful attack, or just hugging them both, waving a hand to invite Remus to join them. And Remus would stand, nearly run up to them, arms open, an emotion like no other welling up in his chest and bringing happy tears to his eyes.

And then they'd fade, and it would just be him, standing along, arms outstretched, with the bitterly cold wind whipping around him, and tears drying on his face. He'd curl back up and want to really _die_, you know. Die in a way that stops everything, die in the way he once thought everyone died.

If Remus had known this was death, he'd have tried to find some sort of immortality. He'd probably be as bad as Voldemort, going after the Philosopher's Stone, or drinking unicorn blood or _anything_, so long as he stayed alive forever, and never, ever died.

But Remus was there forever now, seeing flashes of James and Lily and Sirius, and sometimes Tonks or Wormtail, or Alastor Moody or Dumbledore. He was never going to be free of it, forever the disgusting monster confined to solitude and suffering.

And that wind would never stop raging. And sometimes, he didn't want it to stop.

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**Now I really don't want to die...**

In this, I see it as Remus' own hell, something he created, because he needed to be punished, needed to feel punished for his overbearing guilt, whether he deserved it or not. I'd love to hear your own takes on death, on how Remus came to be in that strange place. 


End file.
